“He must be a real delight,” Sadie snarked.
“What happened?” I asked, thinking of my own possible engagement with his brother.
Hector shrugged. “When Ingrid started letting the Rooks into her borders, she cut off her alliance with Valta. The kingdoms still trade, though, so it couldn’t have been that uncivilized.”
“Of course, my father hated that.” Grae snorted. “If the other kingdoms accepted princesses as heirs, then Briar or Calla could claim the throne of Olmdere and threaten his grab for it.”
“I can hear him prattling on about pack tradition now,” Sadie scoffed. “Funny how he was only sanctimonious when it came to a kingdom with gold mines.”
The group chuckled, but the sound was tinged with bitterness.
I watched as Sadie flexed her hand. She hadn’t shifted so the scar would remain, and I looked down at my own hand.
Grae must have caught all this, because he said, “I still can’t believe you let Sadie pledge her blade to you before me.” He lifted my hand and kissed the thin wound across my palm. His hot breath made the hair on my arms stand on end. “I’m supposed to be your mate.”
“You are my mate,” I said, the words filling me with heat—a claiming of sorts every time they were uttered. “And she is my knight. She offered and I accepted.”
“So you’re really going to do it, take Olmdere’s throne?” Hector asked, pursing his lips.
“Only if we can get this nitehock and kill Sawyn with it. But if by some miracle we do, then . . . “I glanced at Grae. We hadn’t discussed this—what our future would be.
Grae threaded his fingers through mine. “The Queen of Olmdere,” he said, lifting my hand and softly kissing my knuckles. “And I shall be your consort.”
“What? Not King?” Sadie gaped. “You’d give up your Silver crown and the Gold crown beside hers?”
“Damrienn holds no happy memories for me.” He squeezed my hand and the memory of all he told me that day in the woods flashed into my mind. “And Olmdere isn’t mine to claim. It should be a Gold Wolf on the throne, just as Ingrid is on hers.”
I swallowed, tracing his masked face with my eyes. As a man and as my mate, by Wolf law, he had the right to all that was mine . . . and he’d just promised he wouldn’t take it. He’d do the hard things because they were the right things. It was the last piece, that little question still hanging over me, and now, I knew for certain that there was nothing holding me back from this bond.
“This is all well and good, if you can find a way to rescue Maez and defeat Sawyn.” Sadie looked between us. “And so far, the plan consists of us riding into the castle with a bunch of musicians and then hoping for the best?”
“That’s why we’re here now, isn’t it?” I asked, turning to her brother. “With the nitehock we might actually have a fighting chance to rescue Maez.”
“Sawyn will be too busy panicking about her failing powers to stop us rescuing Maez,” Hector said. “I promise.”
“I need another promise from you,” I said, looking at the two siblings. “Once you get Maez, you two need to take her and flee.”
“And leave you two behind?” Sadie’s eyebrows shot up.
The sleigh turned a tight corner and we all pitched to the left. “You need to get Maez back to Damrienn. She needs to break Briar’s curse.”
“But wouldn’t killing Sawyn also break Briar’s curse?” Hector asked. “Surely five Wolves against her is better than two. And with her magic rendered useless by the nitehock, it would be the perfect time to strike, possibly the only time to strike.”
“This is why we need the poison. We need to think like assassins, not warriors.”
“We could dress up as servants. One of us could get close enough to slit her throat as a backup plan if the nitehock fails,” Grae said. I shuddered to think what would happen if the nitehock failed. It was our best plan by a long shot, but Grae was right, it couldn’t be our only plan.
“I could hide up in the rafters with a bow?” Sadie suggested. “I saw a shop with some nice ones in the human quarter.”
“All of them,” I said, lifting my chin. Poisoned, slit throat, shot with a bow and arrow. “We need to try every way. If one fails, the others will be there to take its place. She might catch one, but not all three.” I adjusted the ribbon that held my mask to my face. It was a scarlet mask, covered in delicate lace, a plume of red feathers bursting from the top corner.